Content Destruction
by XxAmi.IzunexX
Summary: Anne is out traipsing in the woods, completing an art project, when Ancients - Ones who dwell in a world void of space and time - decide to use her as a pawn in their game. Torn from the only world she ever knew, what can she do when faced with Akatsuki?
1. Still and Silent

The atmosphere was still and silent as Anne struggled through the dense forest shrubbery, ducking and wriggling her way around the low branches of trees. The harsh unforgiving wood whacked and scraped at her upper body as the thick roots snagged Anne's feet from underneath herself. She walked a few feet more when she was met with a wall of shrubbery. Crouching low to the ground, she pulled her backpack around to her chest and uncomfortably half-crawled, half-crouched under through the particularly thick and tall section of underbrush.

A string of colorful curses spurted forth and into the tranquil forest air when Anne's hair was yanked into the grasp of a passing tree branch. Whipping her hand up, Anne wrenched the hair from the tree's hold, snarling when the clump of hair was relinquished from the branch, but also from her head, leaving a small patch of stinging scalp. She rubbed at her head and muttered obscenities, shouldering her back pack as she continued her way deeper into the forest.

* * *

><p>Half an hour into Anne's hike, she plopped down onto her bottom and swung her pack onto her lap. Opening the bag, she reached into it and rummaged around, finally pulling out a bottle of water and an apple. Munching on the fruit, she took a look at her surroundings. All around her was wild vegetation. Trees soared high above her head, reaching up to the heavens, while vines crawled along the ground, snaking towards Anne. If Anne squinted, she could make out small wildlife as well. A few yards away stood a deer, stock still, staring at her with wide doe eyes, its body riddled with the beautiful patterns of nature in a rich white and chocolate hue. A soot black rabbit darted across a small patch of grass, and towards a hole in the ground next to an old oak tree, where Anne could just see the faces of tiny newborn rabbits peeping out. To her left, Anne could hear the sound of rushing water and, if she strained her eyes and squinted even harder, could also see the tell tale signs of a glistening blue lake.<p>

Anne finished eating her apple, took a swig of water, then opened a compartment in her pack and pulled out a small plastic baggie, placing the leftovers of the fruit inside of it. She threw her water bottle back into her bag and hitched her knapsack up onto her back again.

She continued forward, deeper into the forest.

* * *

><p>I smell bad.<p>

I _hate_ smelling bad.

Wrinkling my nose, I took another sniff near my underarm, making my nose scrunch up even more. _Ugh_.

_But I guess this is what I get for staying out in the sun for so long, wandering around…_

I ran a hand through my sweaty hair and pondered what I was going to do next. I couldn't go drifting around lost in a forest with no goal in sight, after all. I'd die of my stink!

I raked around in my brain to try and find why I came out this deep into the ravine behind my house in the first place – oh right! To find a picture perfect setting, where I can take a snapshot of the scene, go home, and in the comfort of my studio, paint the shot. Why was I doing this again…?

Ah. Yeah. Homework.

_This is _so_ lame…_

But a girl's got to do what a girl's got to do.

I shouldered my pack in an attempt to make myself more comfortable, and licked my left pinky, holding the finger up into the air, hoping to catch a slight draft to point me in the direction I should go. No such luck.

"Okay, then," I muttered. "The invisible, non-blowing wind is guiding me… This way."

I turned on heel and stalked off in the direction where I heard the rush of water.

* * *

><p>My jaw dropped, and my eyes bulged.<p>

I had never ventured this far into the ravine alone before. _I hope I can find my way back home_…

The thought was shoved to the back of my mind as I remembered the spectacle before me. My eyes snapped back to the wonderful, misting, dazzling waterfall.

I'd seen pictures of Niagra Falls before, both the Canadian version and the American, and right now, I tried to compare the amazing thing in front of me with the photographs and postcards that I had received and seen on store shelves.

Those shameful, photoshopped, imitations can't even _begin _to measure up to the real thing.

I held my arm out ahead of me, and even many meters away, I could feel the cool vapor from the waterfall crawling up my arm, soothing all the scratches that I'd gained from the underbrush and calming me down. I sighed in contentment and stepped up to the river bank, right in front of the falls, brandishing my cheap camera and hoping beyond hope that the thing would be able to capture the image before me.

And for once, it did.

I smiled, a big, wide, spreading grin that stretched across my whole face. _I might as well rest here for a bit and relax; I think I deserve it after all that damned hiking._

I let my pack fall from my arms and onto the ground beside me. Using it as a pillow, I spread eagled my limbs, and felt the mist wash over my entire sweaty body while the sunshine that was peeking through the treetops warmed me comfortably. My eyes began to droop, and not a second later, they closed and I drifted through the entrance of La-La Land.

* * *

><p>Soon, Anne Leroy was but a slumbering adolescent in the midst of something mystical; something that happened only once in many millennia. Eyes of all colors – scarlet, fire, gold, emerald, cobalt, cerulean and amethyst, to be exact – peered down at her tiny figure from above in another dimension. Muttered and quiet quarreling ensued.<p>

"Should she-"

"No if-"

"-death, something worse…"

"So what, but a human-"

"-at stake, even if human."

"Stupid, disgusting-"

"Good enough to-"

"_Definitely not_-"

"Hush, she will wake."

One pair of sharp emerald eyes narrowed, and instead of their usual bright electric hue, the color around the irises turned an ugly color of vomit, before flashing once and glowing flaringly bright. The eyes turned themselves to glare at a pair of pale amethyst eyes. "This concerns me because?"

"Because you shall reside in her, and help her through the game we have laid out for her. It will not do you or her well if you do not allow her to rest during her journey."

A murmur of agreement from the others sounded.

"I. Shall. _Not_. I will not be associated with such beasts, much less lower myself to such a level as to _share a body with one_!"

Six pairs of red, orange, yellow, blue, indigo and violet eyes focused themselves on two green ones. A collective voice rose from all the speakers, forming a low, growling rumble that shook the green eyed outline to the core, despite his attempts to hold himself still. "You shall."

The emerald eyes' owner found himself being hurtled down to Earth by a pair of well manicured hands, the smoky tendrils of flames, the slivery strands of golden silk, cold winds that belong to the night sky, the freezing touch of death, and the slight push of conscience and life, into a small, unsuspecting figure's soul.

* * *

><p>Blearily, I slowly opened my eyes, rubbing at them to clear them of sleep muck. <em>Shoot. I fell asleep…<em>

I glanced down at my watch. It read, '2:53 P.M.'. I breathed a sigh of relief. _I still have a few hours to spare incase I still need to do anything until I have to get home…_

Kneading my temples in an attempt to get my brain working, I remembered where I was and why I was there. Sure enough, the magnificent waterfall that I had fallen asleep in front of was still in front of me, mist was still weaving in and out of the air, surrounding the place with a cool embrace and I was still lying beside the falls' riverbank. My unsteady and thick with sleep fingers fumbled with my koala knapsack's buckle, before pulling out my camera and browsing through the pictures I'd taken today. Just like I'd suspected, a superlative picture of the falls was planted on my camera's memory stick.

I kissed my camera's focus lens, than the machine's memory stick. _Thank you so much!_

I was going to spring up from the grass, parade out of the ravine and back into my home singing at the top of my lungs in my victory, and go straight into my studio loft to start painting my picture for my school assignment.

I was going to. I truly was.

But it seemed that Fate wasn't on my side today.

I felt as if someone had tied seven Mt. Everests onto my back when I tried to get up and off the ground; it was a struggle to even get onto my knee. When I tried to place my weight onto said kneeling leg, it collapsed. _What the Hell?_

My whole body trembled with the effort of moving, and by the time I had made the kneeling position again, I was covered with a sheen of gleaming sweat.

Black dots began to dance in front of my eyes. I blinked slowly and sluggishly to try and shoo them away. My limbs stopped responding to my mind's commands, and I slumped onto the lush grass, my head resting on my koala pack once more, since I had taken it off and laid it on the ground in my struggle to get upright and standing.

The mist didn't feel or look very beautiful and calming or soothing anymore. It fogged up my brain, and made everything I saw white. The tendrils of the vapor curled around my fingers as if trying to comfort me, but to me, it seemed as welcome as a bunch of maggots trying to kiss my hand. I tried to wriggle my fingers to make the mist disperse, but I couldn't. I didn't have any energy left at all.

My eyes slid close, and the last thing I felt before I fell into Oblivion's embrace was the ground and sky's shudder, a strange feeling as if everything had gone wrong, and that everything would always be wrong from now on, and the world's impending collapse. After a few more minor tremors from the ground and sky, a sensation of being transported far, far away from anything I ever knew befell me. Unconsciously, and using the very last reserves of my strength, my eyes squeezed out wet, salty tears from fear.

The tears were a bright, emerald green, that turned ugly like vomit, then flashed bright once, and disappeared into the Earth's soil.

Then once again, all was still and silent.

* * *

><p>So yeah! Here's to completely trashing the first copy of this story and recreating a new one! I've got a more solid base and plot on where I want to steer our darling Anne to this time, instead of writing on a complete whim. I hope you guys found this chapter enjoyable!<p>

I don't own Naruto, and never will, even though no Naruto like things appear in this chapter. It was all OC's and rainbows and stuff.

Sending vodka and sunflowers,

Ami


	2. Seramthgin

"Look at that, Senpai! That place has dangos! Let's take a small break!" I squealed, rolling my eyes under my mask. I swung my arms around like the dim-wit the Tobi-guise is. How much more time until I can finally be alone and let this façade just _drop_? It's _so _annoying. "We've been walking for like _forever_; I'm totally beat!"

"Like Hell you are," I heard Deidara mutter as I scampered up the road towards the small shop. When he plopped down beside me, he said, "Seriously, you're such a carefree guy, hmm."

As carefree as I could, I replied airily, "But, Senpai! We're looking for a Bijuu to capture, but we have no idea where it is. Might as well just take it easy, hn!"

After a pause, just to irk Deidara, I added, "Come to think of it, which one was it again?"

"Sanbi! The Sanbi!"

"Ichibi, Nibi, I am Tobi!" I stared at Deidara through my mask's eyehole, watching his eyes widen in disbelief, then narrow in irritation. "Badum, pssh!"

"Here you go. The dangos are done." An old lady padded up towards us, and placed two plates of dangos down onto the floor in between Deidara and me.

Squealing, I said while picking a stick of dangos up, "Whoa-ho-ho! The dangos look so yummy! Let's have a taste."

Beside me, I heard Deidara grunt in slight surprise. I smirked. He thinks he'll get a peek under this mask? Good luck with that, kid… Just to fill up the silence, I said happily, "Time to eat!"

Slowly, I shifted my mask up my face, bringing the dangos closer to my mouth. At the last moment, I whipped away from Deidara. I snickered inaudibly as I pictured the face Deidara was making at me.

I munched on the dangos.

They were actually pretty good.

"It's so delicious! This sauce is great! Not too sweet, not too salty! This is perfection!" I whipped back around and slipped the mask back over my face, a now empty dango stick in my hand. "That was great."

I had to work to keep the smirk out of my voice.

Ah, tricking this little boy is _so _much fun…

All of a sudden a brilliant idea popped to my head. This was sure to make Deidara squirm. Turning my body to face the inside of the shop, I whispered while pointing at a pig-shaped lantern thing, "Senpai, Senpai! Look, look! That looks exactly like your artwork doesn't it? Could it be that your works of art are…" I shifted my pitch of voice from the low one it was before to an annoying high-pitched one. "A cheap rip-off?"

Deidara's reaction was _immediate. _He lowered his head and began to tremble in anger. Subconsciously, a grin spread across my face. I tried to wipe it off my face, but each time, it stretched back into place. I decided I'd leave it there.

"You piece of shit…"

I made an odd, strangled noise from the back of my throat. Quickly, I created a shadow clone, sending it off to run as fast as it could to continue up the path we'd come up from, and stepped into the dimension I had made for myself years before, watching the scene unfold.

"_I'll blast you to Hell!_"

A large boom sounded, and I closed off the portal's connection to the ninja world, just in case some debris managed to find its way into the portal.

Checking to see whether or not I was alone as a precaution, I took off my mask and laughed freely.

_Oh, God, pissing people off is _so _much fun…_

I chortled some more, before straightening up my composure and replacing my mask. I stepped back out into the ninja world.

But not before I felt a strange dissonance – a ripple – in the air.

_What the hell?_

* * *

><p>I was floating. Floating in mid-air. It was so peaceful.<p>

Below me, an air current rushed pass and rocked me gently in my bed of clouds. From somewhere faraway I heard a sweet, lilting tune. My heart wrenched. My mother used to sing me to sleep with that melody…

The dream tilted and flashed into a nightmare. The clouds disappeared, and the heady, soothing feeling of peacefulness vanished, leaving bitter fright in its wake. No longer was I lying in the sky.

Instead, I was steadily sinking into red, burning hot lava.

The lava didn't hurt physically, was what I tried to convince myself of. It was a dream, after all. But the lava _did _hurt physically, even if I couldn't actually feel it. My physical body was slowly peeling away, right before my very eyes, layers of skin, than muscle, than _bone_ showing through. I tried to scream but found I couldn't. I reached up a hand, finding it as a skeleton. With trembling finge- bones, I touched where my throat was supposed to be.

The point of view where I was viewing my nightmare unfold abruptly switched, and I was watching millions of bodies corrode and sink under the magma. Screams pierced the hot unbearable air and died as suddenly as they came as the red hot liquid ate through the throng of people. I knew my face was contorted into rage, panic, and absolute dread. My hand – now, strangely healed, not that I was complaining – reached out unconsciously towards the writhing mass in the pit below.

Up until now, the bodies had no faces that I could clearly make out.

But just then, everybody had the same faces, same features, same _everything_.

The lady over there – my mom. The same white blonde hair, tan face, crinkled-from-smiling blue eyes; except right now, they were staring at me in horror. I could just make out the words she was mouthing.

"Why aren't you saving me?"

To her left – my kid brother. Tousled dirty blonde hair, pale face, bright blue eyes, and out of place freckles; he too, was staring at me.

"Why aren't you protecting me?"

A ghostly image of my dead father appeared beside me. "There's nothing you or I can do about this." He turned his ethereal face towards mine. "Besides, we all belong in the Hell anyways. Humans and Sin. Sin and Humans!"

He cackled manically before poofing into nothing-ness.

There were other people now too, down below. People I hadn't seen before.

There was someone who looked to be like a long lost cousin. Bright blonde hair and bright blue eyes. The person's left eye was covered with some mechanical contraption. He or she was howling, reaching, grasping for anything that would help him or her out. There were decaying mouths on his palms. I turned my gaze from the person before I could see anymore.

There was another person that was half black and half white, and had a disintegrating Venus Fly Trap around his upper body. He didn't say anything, wasn't squirming. His eyes were already glazed over.

Another, another, another.

A pale man with slicked back platinum blonde hair almost whiter than mom's.

Another pale man with raven black hair and red, pinwheel eyes.

A man in a mask that seemed suspended over the chasm, but kept on falling in to the burning scene periodically and wailing like a banshee.

A woman with light blue hair and charred paper covering her body.

A carrot-top man who had piercings all over.

Strange puppets that were attached to shimmery strings that were controlled by another ghost – that eccentrically, looked like a puppet himself – with bright, flaming red hair the shade of the lava.

A man with stitches everywhere and who was fighting with taunting spirits for something – is that money? – even as his own body parts began to fall off.

A man with a blue complexion and fins on his cheeks. A sword that seemed to have a conscience of its own tried to float to the blue man, but was repeatedly yanked back by some invisible force. The blue man cried.

And finally, an emaciated man whose face was devoid and empty of emotion even as he sank deeper and deeper into the deadly liquid. However, when I focused on his eyes, they were flat, dead, and I saw how sad he truly was.

I couldn't take this.

_I can't take this._

"And, _why _exactly, can't you take this?" A voice asked me. It was fluid, soft, and smooth as honey. But there was an undertone that reminded me of the rough earth, the crackle of lightning, the whip of a tornado. "If you can't take even this then I'm afraid you'll just die."

I sobbed. Is it possible to sob in a dream? I sobbed. "I don't want this."

The voice sneered. "Hell, _cupcake_, I don't want this either. Did I get what I want? No. So deal with it."

The tears ran freely now. Was this my subconscious talking to me? How rude. This is _my dream_. I decide what happens.

"Go_ away!_"

"Sorry, cupcake, no can do." The voice sounded almost amused. "Funny you should try taking over control of your mind when you're sharing it with a room-ie though. I don't quite think that that's… _fair_."

In a flash, I was down in the writhing mass of bodies once more, my skin charring, peeling, dying, falling. I gasped, and once more, found I couldn't. I couldn't cry, because my tears evaporated even before they left my body.

It was the most horrid feeling ever.

The voice traveled down to me again. "Look up here, cupcake!"

_Let me die already. Let this end. Let me _wake up!

"Nu-uh, not yet." Two fingers tilted the skeleton of my face up. If I was disintegrated already, why could I still see? "Take a look at these, and remember them."

Two emerald green eyes slowly opened in front of me. They both flashed and crackled, like they were charged with electricity. A few moments later, they turned a mossy green, and I could've sworn I saw a squirrel appear in both eyes before darting away. What the hell? There aren't any squirrels here.

"Remember my eyes well, cupcake." The eyes lifted slightly, as if the person owning them were smiling. "Now go to sleep."

The two fingers that had lifted my skull up turned into two hands that pushed me down all the way into the lava.

* * *

><p>I woke up screaming bloody murder, my chest heaving, and my whole body sweating like I'd just taken a bath in lava<em>. No pun intended.<em>

The voice and the eyes of my dream; they sent shivers down my spine and made my brain go haywire. I was afraid to open my eyes. What if I found that I was on the tip of a gigantic cliff, and was about to tumble down into the lava below from those cold, slim hands?

But my senses told me otherwise. Soft grass cushioned my body, not bubbling magma. The air felt cool and breathable, unlike the ashy, disgusting air in my dream.

I sluggishly opened my eyes, blinking rapidly at the brightness beyond my lids. I reached up to rub my eyes, but my arm felt like someone had replaced my muscles and bones with a dozen bags of sand. I let the limb fall back to my side

_Where am I? _I wondered offhandedly. Wherever I was, it sure was comfy. _Am I at home?_

But when did mom remake the tiled floor of our house, the furniture and beds of our house, into grass?

I slowly re-opened my eyes, testing their sensitivity to the bright light of the sun. Eventually, after much cursing and heavy blinking, my eyes adjusted enough and I could make out my surroundings without having to squint like an angry creeper.

I was on forest ground, in a meadow of some sort. My mind was still fumbling and disoriented from my frightening dream – were those green eyes over there staring at me? Get away! – and it took a while for me to realize that my surroundings were not familiar.

_I fell asleep - or did I fall unconscious? - near a waterfall, no? I don't know this place... Where's my stuff? Wait... If I don't know this place, that means I've never been here, which means..._

_I'm not at home anymore._

I let loose another ear-piercing shriek. This time, instead of a dream, my fear sprouted from the prospect of never, ever being able to find home again. I won't be able to see mom again, my brother again, my friends again, my dog again…

"_Someone, anyone, help!"_

* * *

><p>FIRST THINGS FIRST. DOES ANYONE KNOW WHAT 'SERAMTHGIN' IS SUPPOSED TO REPRESENT? IF YOU KNOW, SAY IT IN A REVIEW AND YOU GET BRAGGING RIGHTS.<p>

NEXT THINGS NEXT. ANNE MIGHT SEEM A BIT PANICKY IN HERE. AND SOMETHINGS MIGHT CONFUSE PEOPLE. IF YOU ARE ONE OF THOSE PEOPLE, DROP ME A PM OR REVIEW OR SOMETHING THAT TELLS ME WHAT CONFUSES YOU, SO I CAN TRY AND CHANGE THE WORDING IN THE CHAPTER FOR FUTURE REFERENCE AND OTHER STUFF. SUCH AS EXPLAINING WHAT YOU GOT CONFUSED ABOUT.

LAST THINGS LAST. I KNOW I'M AN EXTREME DOUCHE FOR COMMITTING THE CRIME OF 'NON-UPDATER'. MY SINCEREST APOLOGIES. AND I ALSO KNOW I'M A DOUCHE FOR COMMITTING THE CRIME OF 'EXTREMELYLONGA/NSHUTTHEHELLUPAUTHOR'. MY SORT OF SINCERE APOLOGIES.

Don't own Naruto. Yet. I'm planning to overthrow Kishimoto and turn Naruto's characters over to their rightful fangirls. WHO'S WITH ME?

Ah yeah, and thank you: deathnotefan1, blackcatgirl, XxBishxX, and Suki77 for reviewing! You guys rock!

Ah yeah, and thank you: Midnighter67, Suki77, TheParadoxicalOtaku, and XxBishxX for favoriting! You guys make my days ten times better!

Ah yeah, and thank you: blackcatgirl, Lil' Bunny Lynn-Lynn, Midnighter67, Moonlight Kyuubi, phoenixyfriend, Suki77, and XxBishxX for story alerting! Man, if it weren't for you guys… This still would be in the making! And probably wouldn't be up for another ten years!

I owe it all to you guys! And cookies!

So, like, hey. How you doing? This took hell to upload (not really) and I'm about to cry from over working (tch, yeah right) and my eye sight just dropped by a million degrees because of spending so much time editing and revising and perfecting this (in my dreams). So you'd better appreciate this and leave a review! (I'd be surprised if anyone even VIEWED this much less REVIEWED it…)

Uh, yeah.

Have a nice day/night/noon/afternoon/morning!~

Sending vodka and sunflowers,

Ami


	3. Suspicions

Tobi froze halfway inside his portal, and halfway out. Decisively, he retreated back into his secret haven and removed his mask once more.

_What was that? _Tobi frowned. He did not like being caught off guard. _That scream; judging by how soft yet urgent it sounded, the person or whatever had screamed was pretty far away. Does it have something to do with that atmosphere disturbance earlier? _

Tobi weakened the door to his world just enough so that he could see what was happening outside of his sanctuary, but not too much that people in the outside world could see what was happening where he was. He peered out.

Deidara seemed to have gone ahead of him, expecting to find him on the path somewhere. He'd left no indication that they'd been at the dango shop; he'd blown the little store up. Tobi nodded approvingly. The bomb that Deidara had used was just subtle enough to make outsiders think that the small restaurant had burnt down from some freak accident. The old lady that had served them lay face down on the ground a few feet away from the remains of her home and work place. She smelled of burnt flesh.

_I must have been inside my dimension for some time now, _Tobi thought. _The damage that Deidara's done seems to have been dealt at least fifteen minutes ago. The wood's not on fire anymore and nothing seems to be smoldering. How far can Deidara travel in fifteen minutes?_

A long way, that Tobi knew of. Even if Deidara dawdled or walked half the pace he usually did, he'd still be able to cover at least three quarters of a kilometer. Would that have been far enough for him not to hear the scream? Tobi hoped so. He didn't want Deidara to go blowing however screamed up immediately. The Akatsuki might be able to use said person as an infiltration

Tobi gently stretched the fabric of his dimension's reality, replaced his mask, and stepped out, back into the world he'd been born to; the world he was about to take hold of.

Trudging through the underbrush, Tobi glanced around warily through his mask's eye hole. There didn't seem to be anything wrong. This far in, he'd been able to guess the screamer's location from the repeated shrieks that pierced the air.

On a hunch, he took a sharp left, and froze.

In the clearing, an adolescent girl was clutching her head, breathing hard. Half slung over her shoulder was a pack in the shape of a strange animal. Long, tight blue pants clung to her legs seemingly uncomfortably, and she wore neon green jacket like thing that Tobi had never seen before. She had bright blonde hair, almost like Deidara's, except paler, and her face was flushed red. Her eyes were puffy around the edges as if she'd been crying. They flashed an electric blue. Tobi squinted. That's strange; did they turn green just now?

Tobi drew back a few steps, contemplating his next moves. _The girl was scrawny, _Tobi thought, _and what meat she did have on her arms and the other visible parts of her body were loose. That means she isn't a ninja, and probably can't fight worth anything. No muscle. But what if a village decided to take one of its inhabitants and plop her in the middle of a forest to draw out unfortunate passers for hidden motives? That could very well be a possibility… However, the village in that scenario would have to be a new one or one that had lived in complete secrecy. I've never seen a girl wear her types of clothes._

Tobi's black eyebrows traveled farther and farther down his forehead. There was something unusual about this girl, something that he was overlooking.

Then it hit him. He hadn't been able to sense her presence. He still couldn't feel her chakra. Tobi activated his Sharingan, and scrutinized her.

Nothing.

The Sharingan of his visible eye narrowed as Tobi pondered what this might mean. Perhaps she was a undercover spy that has a special kekkei genkei that could mask her chakra? But the Sharingan; the Sharingan should be able to see through almost everything, including kekkei genkei.

Tobi slowly opened his kunai pouch and pulled one out. _I'll have to see who this person is… The messy way._

* * *

><p>I curled myself up in a ball after I'd finished screaming, my chest heaving up and down erratically. I felt my breathing quicken; what was happening to me?<p>

Tears streamed down my cheeks, but I didn't have the strength to wipe them away. They flooded my vision, casting the world in a blurry mess. I sobbed.

My memories of what had happened before I had fainted had come back to me in flashes as I'd screamed my throat sore for help. The curling white mist. The beautiful waterfall. My art project. The ravine behind my backyard.

My mom's smile as she called, "Come back soon in time for dinner!"

I tried to scream again, but it came out as a croak.

_What am I gonna _do_? This isn't my ravine; the trees, the underbrush – they don't belong and can't grow where I live. So where the hell am I? I need to call for help; fat lot of good that's done me. Where is _civilization_? Where're the _police for god's _– _

A hand grabbed my hair and yanked my upright into a kneeling position. I croaked another time, in response.

"Anata dare? Anata wa dono mura karadeari, anata no dōki wa nanidesu ka? O oshie, matawa kore wa anata no dōmyaku o migi ni iki," the person who was holding me upright and wrenching my hair pressed something cold and metallic against my vulnerable neck, "watashi wa anata o gōmon shite iru toki ni shukketsu shite shibō surudeshou."

I gasped. I choked. I struggled weakly.

The person chuckled.

"Watashi no shitsumon'nikotaeru made, watashi wa anata o ataerudarou."

"L-let go of m-me." My voice trembled and cracked. I cursed in my mind. I turned my head as much as I dared to when there was a sharp pointy thing at my throat and took a look at my captor. The person wore an orange mask with one eye hole. I peered inside the eye hole, and found slowly swirling pinwheels.

I felt something probing my mind, intruding my thoughts. I tried to turn away, but found I couldn't, found I was captivated.

Just as the obtrusive tentacle of thought gleaned the surface of my conscience, a wall slammed down of my subconscious's own accord, and the person holding me jerked back violently away from me.

"Anata… dare?"

I tried to turn my head to look directly at him, instead of staring from the corner of my eye, but the sharp pointy thing he held at my neck kept me from doing much. "Who… are you?"

My body couldn't take anymore. I slumped on to the grass. The grip on my hair and the arm that had been half supporting me up let me fall.

I fell face first into sleep and made a V.I.P. entrance back into La-La Land.

* * *

><p>Tobi silently glared at the fainted figure in front of him. It dozed on without noticing.<p>

_How could she have blocked me out of her thoughts? _Tobi raged. _That jutsu I used with my Sharingan was perfect; nothing could hold it back, much less completely over power it! _

The girl had seemed harmless enough. When Tobi had pulled her upright, she hadn't resisted a single bit. Tobi'd go as far as to say that she was limp in his arms. And when Tobi'd questioned then threatened her – who are you, which village are you from, what are you motives, the normal – , she had seemed wary and scared; her body language had told him that much. The strange thing was, she hadn't seemed to understand him, and the little things that she _had _said didn't make much sense; gibberish.

Tobi checked her pulse. It jumped at a steady beat; a beat that told him she was knocked out. _She might be useful…_

Tobi was about to pick her up on to his shoulder and carry her back to Deidara, claiming something ridiculous and fabricating some dumb reason about why they should keep the girl around, if just for one night until Deidara saw fit. Tobi knew Deidara would say yes in the end, after a lot of annoying and pestering on his part.

Tobi was about to do exactly that; until he saw her pack again, hanging droopily on the girl's right arm. Reaching down, he opened the pack and rummaged through the contents.

An apple core in a plastic baggie.

A camera.

A sketch pad and a purse full of art supplies.

A tightly closed circular object.

A note book.

And – Tobi had the decency to blush while pulling this out – feminine hygiene products.

Tobi grumbled and shoved everything he'd dumped on to the forest ground back into the girl's pack. There was nothing that seemed suspicious – the girl didn't even have the mandatory undercover ninja bingo book, which crosses her off the list of being some spy or ANBU. Everything she carried was normal.

Normal irked Tobi extremely.

Tobi sat back on his haunches, considering whether or not to take the girl. No matter how harmless she looked, there was always the slight chance that she could be of harm to the Akatsuki; not that Tobi was extremely concerned about that problem. If it came down to it, one of the members could always dispose of her, or Tobi could do so himself.

However, be that as it may, Tobi still felt unsettled, and his gut warned him that he'd be making a grave mistake by taking this frail, harmless girl into his hospitality.

Tobi shoved the thought away and swung the girl on to his shoulder. He'd make up a story for Deidara, and if by tomorrow, the girl still wouldn't speak of her origins, than Tobi'd have to allow Deidara to have his way with her, as he'd be so anxious to. Tobi had always wondered what a girl's guts looked like when they were blown out from its host's body.

Leaping through the trees and scanning the ground for any sign of a blonde bomber, Tobi had one last disturbing thought.

The girl's eyes had flashed an angry green the second before she'd broken out of his Sharingan.

In that second, with his eye, he'd seen an absolutely furious and chilling face staring back at him. It had mouthed, if Tobi remembered correctly, _You are dead._

Tobi shrugged the thought off and continued searching for his 'Senpai'.

* * *

><p>Hey there~~ I don't own dear Tobi or Deidara~~<p>

I'm really bored right now~~~

Thanks to: Sukki18, SilverMoonKitty, and phoenixyfriend, for reviewing last chap!

Thanks to: SilverMoonKitty and Sukki18 for the new favorites!

Thanks to: daydreamer1008 for the new alert!

Thanks to: everybody else!

Special thanks to phoenixyfriend for giving me some pointers on my writing! I'll get around to fixing that stuff right after I wake up enough to start writing properly! And stop procrastinating!

I can't believe I actually got this up in a week…

AND. PHOENIXYFRIEND GUESSED THE MEANING OF LAST CHAPTER'S NAME. SERAMTHGIN IS NIGHTMARES BACKWARDS.

Sending vodka and sunflowers,

Ami


	4. Shattered

Deidara didn't look up when his partner in crime walked into the hotel room they were staying in, spewing loud greetings and his ever present annoying atmosphere.

Deidara dug into his clay pouch, pulling some of the stuff out and stuffing it into his mouth hands. When the small bird sculpture was ready, he admired it for a small time, tuning Tobi's banter out all the while. Fixing some minor faults in the petit avian using his fingers, Deidara threw it out the window and allowed it to create a small explosion. Deidara sighed contently, a tiny smile gracing his features.

A black gloved waving hand was then shoved into his face.

Deidara scowled, smile gone. Impatiently, he hissed, "What do you want, hmm?"

"Can we keep her?" Tobi whined, pointing to the room's couch. "Please?"

Deidara frowned, and turned to face the piece of furniture Tobi was pointing to. His eyes widened, displaying his surprise, at the girl that was splayed out and lying there. He turned back to his partner. "_Who the hell is she?_"

Tobi gulped. "T-tobi found her. She's a good girl! Tobi's a good boy! Don't hurt Tobi!"

Groaning, Dediara slumped back into his chair, and pinched the bridge of his nose.

_Of all the _stupid_ things for a criminal to do… Of all the stupid things for _Tobi _to do!_ Deidara seethed. _He brought a _girl _to the place we're staying? How much more _daft_ can he get?!_

"Please, Senpai! Please, can we please keep her?" Tobi continued whining. "Please, please, pleaaaase?"

"Shut _up_!" Deidara raged. "Shut up, for god's sake, hmm!"

The girl stirred. Deidara snapped his eyes to her. He frowned. There was something off, something he hadn't noticed before now…

"Tobi." Deidara said.

"Senpai?" Tobi answered.

"Do you sense… this girl's chakra?"

"Nope, Tobi doesn't sense any chakra at all from the girl!" Tobi chirped brightly.

"Huh." Deidara muttered. "Is that why you brought her, hmm?"

"Yes, Senpai!"

Deidara abruptly stood up from his chair. He stomped over to Tobi. Looking his partner straight in his mask's eyehole, Deidara sucker punched Tobi, hating the fact that his fist merely passed through the man's body because of some stupid jutsu his partner had. "You _idiot!_ She has to be a god damned _spy _sent from some _stupid village to find out what we're doing and where we are!_ Get her _out _of here before she has the chance to _send for some of her god damned friends, hmm!_"

Tobi cowered away from Deidara. "B-but Sen-"

"Get. Her. _Out!_" Deidara snarled. "_Now!"_

* * *

><p>I woke up to screaming and a killer headache.<p>

Those two things do _not _mix.

I groaned slightly, and rolled over on my belly, wrapping my arms around my head and trying to block out the argument that was going on around me. I curled my body into the fetal position, mumbling out a weak, "Bro, Mom, Dad, whoever – go outside to PMS. Not in my flippin' room, for god's sake…"

The conversation abruptly stopped.

"Thank you… Argh!"

Someone had me by my hair, half supporting me with a hand on my shoulder, and half just letting me dangle. I weakly pushed at the person, still too sleepy to do anything too action oriented. "Stop that. Go away…"

"Nanimoshinai to kurō shite imasen. Watashi wa anata ni sonoyōni koroshite inai baai ga arimasu, hmm, " a cold, deep voice sounded beside my ear.

I struggled in his clutch. "Let me go!"

I dragged my eye lids upwards drowsily and was faced with a sharp bright light that made me snap them shut again. A few seconds later, I slowly opened them again.

And instead of light, was this time faced with a face from my nightmares.

Eyes widening fearfully, I screamed bloody murder.

* * *

><p>"Shit!" I cursed, and slapped my hand over the girl's mouth, careful to keep my hand mouths closed. I let her fall back onto the couch. "Be quiet, or else! Don't you dare contact any of your teammates!"<p>

The girl kept on muttering words against my hand, and I had to work hard to resist the urge to let my hand mouth lick her just to scare her into silence. "I said, shut up, hmm!"

"Senpai! Tobi thinks-"

"You're not thinking at all! She might have just sent out a signal to her friends, and we'd have no clue! If you were thinking, you'd've killed her right on the spot!" I ran my spare hand through my hair agitatedly, my other hand still holding the girl down. "Well? I'm not going to fix the stupid mistake you made! Kill her already, hmm!"

"But Senpai, we can't kill her! She doesn't speak our language; when Tobi caught her before, the girl spoke a different language. She might be a princess we could use for ransom! And look at her clothes-"

"I don't give a shit about the girl's clothes or her origin!"

"But Senpai, she can't possibly be of any harm to us. Look!" Tobi poked the girl's arm. His finger dug into the flesh. "She doesn't have any muscle at all. She can't be a kunoichi."

I glared down at the trembling girl. Tobi was right; she didn't look harmful at all.

But I wasn't about to be proved wrong by a stupid partner.

"It must be a genjutsu, hmm." I stated flatly. "We've never come across anybody besides jinchuriki and people who wanted to kill us on our missions; this must be a new tactic they're trying out to spy on us."

"But Senpai," Tobi said for a third time, "it doesn't look like a genjutsu to me."

I rounded on him, frustrated. "What's your point? We can't keep her either way; whether or not she's a ninja or a villager is of no concern to us! Our main goal is to capture the Sanbi and if we have to, which we do since we're S-rank criminals, cause destruction along the way, hmm!"

Tobi recoiled. "Can't we keep her for just one night? If you really want to kill her, can we please just do it tomorrow?" He faked a yawn. "Tobi's dead tired and doesn't want to do any more killing."

That was it. I yanked Tobi down to my height releasing the girl – god damn him for being taller than me! – and growled, "You are a friggin' S-Rank criminal. You are no '_good boy'_. We _kill _people for a living. Do you hear me, hmm? _So kill the stupid girl._"

* * *

><p>I slowly backed away from the two extremely strange people when the blonde one from my nightmare began to rough up the masked one from my nightmare and pull him down to the blonde one's height. They spoke some strange nightmare-y mumbo jumbo and they dressed in some strange nightmare-y jumbo mumbo and they were in my <em>strangely very mumbo jumbo-ey nightmares. <em>

I could feel my breath coming quicker already. My chest began heaving again. I wanted to cry. The blonde one and the masked one – they were both from the nightmare I had before I woke up in this friggin' strange mumbo jumbo-ey place, the nightmare that had scared the living sleep lights out of me, where my family and these people and others were drowning in lava and disintegrating before my very eyes and my dead father went psycho crap like and two bright green eyes prophesized some sort of shit about me. _Two of the people in my flippin' nightmare were standing in front of me, arguing. Does that mean that the lava and the Hell are going to come soon too? Are the green eyes going to kill me, and make me disintegrate all over again? _

Curling into a ball on the couch, I continued to shuffle away from the two nightmarish people. A mantra soon overran my mind, repeating itself over and over again, until it was the only thing I thought of, until the words were so slurred together that I almost had trouble telling them apart. I thought, over and over, _I don't want this… I don't want this Idont wantthis idont wantthis idontwantthisidontwantthisid ontwantthis_IDONTWANTTHIS!

Déjà vu swept my senses away. I've felt this awful and weak before: feelings of complete helplessness and breaking… Long, long ago.

* * *

><p><strong>Walking hand in hand with Mommy, I twirled ecstatically in my new sundress and matching hat. I usually didn't wear dresses or hats because they were too much trouble to put on, or they kept on blowing away in the warm summer wind, but today was special. <strong>

** Today, I was going to graduate from kindergarten! **

** Mommy was talking excitedly, cooing things like 'my baby's all grown up' and 'congrats, darling, you're a big girl now' and 'I love you so much'. I beamed happily all the while.**

** We were at the mall handpicking candies to put into the center of the cupcakes we were going to bake for my big day. We had gone through three stores so far: Bulk Barn, Wal-Mart, and Sweet Tooth, but we only had two bags full. I rifled through the bag I was holding and sang out to Mommy, "We've got gummy worms, gummy bears, gummy **_**everythings**_**, jelly beans, chocolate and squishy fruit candies. What've you got in your bag, Mommy?"**

** Mommy seized holding my hand for a moment, balancing her hand bag on her knee as she peeked into her candy bag. "Well, Anne-dear, I've got-"**

** I didn't get to hear her talk about what she had in her bag, because at that moment, I was snatched away by burly hands, my newly bought hat flying off from the strong jerk. Too shocked to scream, I was silent for five full seconds before it came to me to screech for help, but by then, a sickly-sweet smelling cloth was placed over my nose, and with one whiff came Oblivion.**

* * *

><p><strong> I woke up some time later, with a hurting head, gagged mouth and tied limbs. The light above me was far too bright for my eyes to adjust to, so I squeezed them shut tightly. A gruff voice had said, "Hey, the bitch's awake."<strong>

** I didn't know what 'bitch' actually meant at the time, but Mommy had told me that it was bad when I had asked her what it meant after hearing a boy shouting it at a girl on the street. **

** A pair of rough finger tips tilted my head upwards, and stared at my face, scrutinizing my every feature. He slanted my head this way and that. "Pretty one, ain't she?" His breath smelled of alcohol and beer and something unpleasant, like a skunk.**

** It came to my little graduating-kindergarten mind to smart mouth him, but when I tried to speak, it then came to my little graduating-kindergarten mind that speaking against a gag was not very fun. Instead, I settled for glaring at him in the way only a little kid of six years could.**

** With innocence and the simplicity of a child.**

** That innocence and simplicity was stripped away from me in the first six hours of keeping those men company.**

** A bark of laughter from the man had filled the room's silence, and a sharp whack to the back of my neck brought silence to my thoughts.**

** I was kept in their confinement for two days. Two complete days of torture, maltreatment and horror, day, night, and every second in between.**

** I was considerably lucky, for a girl in my position. Since a multi-billionaire had already placed a 'bid' on me for one million dollars, **_**if**_** I was kept in perfect condition, I wasn't hurt on the outside. The men who had kidnapped me, Arnold and Revvy, contented themselves to hurting me on the inside, by making me watch while one or two of them tortured the other girls that they had brought here. **

** Two complete days of torture, maltreatment and horror, day, night, and every second in between killed a young six year old girl inside. I was but a blank slate – no emotions, no feelings – by the time the men had gone through the fourth round, the sixth hour, of the first day.**

** Eventually, men in officer suits found the place they were keeping us kidnapped girls, and we were taken away to the hospital for help. I was taken to a special hospital. They called it a 'temporary asylum for those in need'.**

** A kind lady in a business suit explained that the bad men were to be sentenced to a lifetime of jail, and would be kept away from people so that they wouldn't cause harm to society again. I asked her why they had done this to little girls who had never done anything to them. She said evilness. Eventually though, she told me the real truth. "Anne, your family is very rich and famous, as were the other girls. Your father is a very successful lawyer, and your mother a brilliant politician. The men probably wanted to sell you or the other girls to someone who would most likely hold you ransom, or sell you out for human trafficking."**

** I didn't like her truthful answer, after I had figured out what each of the big words in her sentence meant.**

** The first few days in the asylum were spent with doctors and nurses and mental tests. I couldn't bring myself to care about my surroundings at all. It didn't matter that I couldn't see my family, or go to school, or go back home, or do whatever I like. It didn't matter what I ate, drank, when I slept, woke up. I couldn't bring myself to care at all.**

**I was drifting through a trance world that was mixed in with the real world, but the kicker was I couldn't decipher between the two. Sometimes, I would be eating my lunch or doing normal things. Other times, I would be cowering from nightmarish monsters that were hurting faceless girls. The two realities blended so well together that they both felt authentic.**

**The doctors that were to help 'make me better' weren't very good at helping me. They just bustled about me, giving me this drug, making me drink that, giving me shots, but nothing was really 'helping me get better'. **

**Relatives weren't allowed to see me because the doctors said that they would just make my 'condition' worse, but one rainy day, a man with green eyes came to visit. Unlike the doctors who would only talk about 'the good in the real world' and 'the need to **_**snap out of it and wake up from your dream**_**' as well as other nonsensical things, this man was different.**

**He got straight to the point. "If you don't start smiling again," he said, "than your mother and father and brother and dog and cousins and aunts and uncles and friends and teachers and everyone you have ever known will be very sad, cupcake. The very earth is crying for you," here, he pointed out the window, at the rain, "and it is saying that it will wreck havoc if you don't smile again."**

**I didn't want the earth wrecking havoc because of me, or my family and friends and teachers being sad, so I twitched the corners of my mouth upwards. The action felt absurd; it had been so long since I had smiled.**

**But the man just snorted, and said, "Well, we're getting somewhere, at least. Everyone's a bit brighter now. Good job. Next time, just add some soul to that smile, so it won't be as empty, and we'll be half way there, cupcake."**

**I wanted to ask, 'half way where?' but the next second, the man was gone. When I asked the escorting nurse who the green eyed man was, she looked at me worriedly, and scribbled something down on her clip board quickly before giving me a wavering smile and saying in a very unconvincing way, "Oh, uh, just… Just Dr. McHael's brother."**

**Every week from then on, Mr. Green Eyes would visit me, and encourage me. The first few times, he would get me to smile more and more, warning me that if I didn't the world would be as dark and gloomy as it was in the asylum, and since I never wanted that, I would always smile. Then, on the third visit, instead of his usual warning, he told me, "Knock, knock."**

**So caught off guard was my six-year old self, I was momentarily speechless. The man laughed, and in a stage whisper, whispered, "You're supposed to ask me 'who's there', cupcake."**

**Still quite speechless, I only managed an extremely quiet murmur. "Who's there?"**

"**Interrupting cow."**

"**I-interruptin-"**

"_**Moo."**_

**Chuckling at his joke, Mr. Green Eyes chortled and said, "Smile, Anne."**

**It was only until five minutes after the man's disappearance did I finally understand the joke. Catching me off guard, the man had made me smile, for the first time in three weeks and two days, with my soul.**

**Mr. Green Eyes visits soon became more and more conversational than strict. Sometimes he would ask me about my opinion on a drawing he had brought with him. Other times he'd just sit and burst into quiet games with me out of the blue, such as hang man, or some clapping game I'd never heard of. My mix-ups between reality and nightmares became few and far between. I came to look forward to visit days, and would always be on the edge of my seat when I saw Mr. Green Eyes saunter into the room.**

**The doctors, however, didn't take kindly to my speaking of the man, because they thought the man was one of my 'hallucinations' even when I kept on explaining that Mr. Green Eyes was a good and most importantly, **_**real**_** person, and that he was nice and helpful. Doubtful though they were, the doctors couldn't deny the fact that I was becoming more and more talkative than the solemn dead-eyed girl that had been welcomed into the asylum the first day. And so, they listened when I told them about the latest jokes Mr. Green Eyes shared with me, or the latest items he'd brought with him, all the while eying each other nervously.**

** By my thirteenth week in the institute, I was beyond bored which probably meant, in doctors' terms, that I was 'able to function normally again'. My family was permitted to visit me, and when I saw them, I broke down and flung myself into Mommy and Daddy and my brother's arms, even getting on the floor to fling myself onto my dog. Mommy and Daddy and my brother thanked the doctors profusely, while the doctors pretended to be modest. They said that I was very lucky, only 'half-broken', and just barely able to save from insanity. They talked about how I had been retreating into my mind, into an unbreakable dream realm, and where I would surely die if I were too far in. They boasted about how they had just managed to pull me out, and had therefore saved my life.**

** I noticed how they never talked about Mr. Green Eyes, even though he was standing right there, beside them, smiling. He nodded at me. 'Smile, cupcake', he mouthed. Then, with an extravagant twirl, he was gone, and in his place laid my kindergarten graduation sun hat. Gasping, I dived for it, but when I touched it, it disintegrated into a pile of flower petals. My dog snuffled at it, nosing the mound around, but my parents and the doctors didn't seem to see Mr. Green Eyes's last gift. I picked up one of the petals, placing it into my asylum inmate dress, but for that very show of 'insanity' as the doctors would say; I was to be kept in the asylum for another week 'just in case.'**

** When I was finally let out, the doctors and police men all warned my parents to keep an extra close eye on me, for the reasons of another kidnap attempt, and, in the doctors' case, to see if I had 'recovered properly' and if I needed another few weeks in the institute. **

** At home, I was jumpy and easily frightened, and wouldn't make any physical contact with my family members until half a year later because of what I'd seen with the kidnappers, even though I'd hugged them when I had first seen them at the asylum. The doctors had assured my family that this was perfectly normal behavior for someone who had just endured what I had endured, before reminding them to heighten up our home's security in case of another kidnapping.**

** Which, as if Fate liked to wreck misery amongst my family, happened years later.**

* * *

><p><strong> In my freshman year of high school, the men who had kidnapped me for human trafficking and ransom years ago escaped from their eternal jail sentence, and were now at large once more.<strong>

** The police had warned the public that according to their resources, the two criminals' first destination was to retrieve a million dollar prize from a small town. Namely, me. **

** The security procedures that had died over the years in my household were instantly renewed and put into action again. I wasn't even allowed to be anywhere in my house without letting someone know. The local police, aware that I had been a victim when I was six, checked up on my family every third day. **

** People at school joked about how lucky I was, to have trained officers patrolling my home, and to be fawned over. I couldn't bring myself to tell them of my time in the asylum, or the two days I had spent with the criminals, so I just smiled waveringly and went with the joke.**

** During the tense period of being afraid of another kidnapping attempt, a transfer student was introduced to our class. He was a boy named Ides Orient and was rumored to be from Antarctica. He had bright green eyes and was very obnoxious; a downright smart ass who couldn't keep his mouth shut. In the increasingly edgy and apprehensive state my family was in, I didn't pay much attention to him, even though each time he spoke to me, he would always call me 'cupcake', reminding me eerily of a particular someone I had met years and years before.**

** I was at the mall with my friends one Saturday; we were shopping for our Hallowe'en costumes because the high school was holding a big party. I had finished buying my costume – a female pirate outfit, complete with a sword and everything – and needed to use the washroom, so I offered to go and buy some ice cream for my friends on the way back from the rest room.**

** The trip to the washroom went a-okay. It was only after I finished purchasing three cones of ice-cream and was on my way back to the last place I'd seen my friends did something go wrong. **

** My hands were too full to properly defend myself when **_**it**_** happened; my right hand had been juggling five ice-cream cups and cones as well as holding three bags full of clothes while my left hand was balancing some wooden carvings I had taken a liking to. **_**It **_**happened without any warning.**

** A black clothe was thrown over my eyes and a hand muffled my screams. I was forcibly dragged into a deserted corridor. I tried to drop everything I was holding so I could fight back, but resorted to thrashing around and punching and kicking when dropping things turned out to take too much time. Nothing I threw at my captors connected and soon, a sweet sickly scent stole over me, the same it did years and years before.**

* * *

><p><strong> I woke in a grand room that was bathed in the golden light of the sun. A diamond chandelier hung above me, revolving in slow, mesmerizing circles while it hung from its domed ceiling, and the recliner I was lying on was plush and cushion-y. However, when I tried to sit up, I found cold metal clamps around my abdomen, wrists, legs, and ankles. <strong>

** "Hello?" I had called into the empty room, my voice cracking from non-use. "Is anyone here?"**

** A young boy had bounced into my line of vision at the sound of my words. The kid was eerie in an extremely unsettling way – while the body and face of the child definitely belonged to a nine or ten year old, the depth and understanding of the boy's wide eyes was scary and unnatural. **

** "Hello!" The child chirped. "How are you feeling? We've just given you a gigantic dosage of ****diphenhydramine, a drug found in Benadryl, which will most likely cause some hallucinations in moments." The boy smiled. "Now before you get to that stage, let me tell you some stuff 'bout me. My name is something that I won't tell you, I'm actually fifty seven years old, and I'm a multi-billionaire. I get my money from the many times I've helped society with my medications and scientific discoveries. I'm the person that put a bid on you for a million dollars when you were six. Remember?" He beamed. "Yes, I was the one that contacted the two kidnappers, Arnold and Revvy to bring me a small child that was pleasing to the eyes and was to be in the right mind. I suppose I can still experiment on you, now that you're a teenager. I don't suppose it will cause any difference to the results. Great, isn't it?"**

**I was tempted to laugh. Was this all a sick joke? "Look, kid, can I speak to you parents and thank them for saving…"**

** My voice trailed off because as I spoke to the boy, a transformation was beginning to take place on his body. Tree limbs were spouting and growing out from the little boy's ears, eyes, nose, mouth, and now, even the very pores on his skin. They expanded and expanded until the poor kid became a living, breathing, walking, talking **_**tree**_**. "My parents are long decomposed," the tree was saying, "they disintegrated because the birds ate them."**

** I tried to shuffle backwards and away from the tree but found birds biting my limbs and keeping me chained to the moving shimmering mass I was lying on. Upon closer examination, to my revulsion, I found that the things I was lying on were moving, writhing, bugs. I gasped, and screamed at the boy turned tree, "Get me out of here!"**

** It merely laughed, and laughed, and cackled, and from its deranged branches, scorpions crawled out, holding mirrors. They surrounded me, and two scorpions used their stingers to force my head to turn towards the thousands of mirrors. What I saw as my reflection disgusted and repulsed and scared me – there I was, in the mirror, except it wasn't me. The girl in the mirror looked crazy, almost maniacal. She had a too-wide smile, and her eyes were bloodshot. All of a sudden, her eye sockets were empty, her mouth was gaping wide in a weird parody of a smile, and everything I had ever been afraid of crawled out of the mirror girl's face. Rickety dolls with fake, plastered on smiles, turned their heads towards me as they fell from the empty eye sockets and mouth. Clowns cackled and threw butcher knives at me, before stabbing or hanging themselves. **

** I screamed my throat raw, wriggling helplessly in my binds in vain attempts to escape from the terrible things in front of me. Pain shot up my arms and legs; my skull felt cracked. Was that blood dripping down my forehead? My arm – I can't feel my arm. Was it stabbed by the onslaught of insanity? Take this all **_**away**_**…**

** A pair of pained emerald eyes appeared above me in the midst of craziness. **_**Sleep**_**, it whispered. After a moment, wryly, it added, **_**Remember to smile, cupcake.**_

** …**_**Mr. Green Eyes?**_

* * *

><p><strong> I was subjected to more and more experimentation. The diphenhydramine had just been the beginning – the other tests were increasingly painful. In between experiments, the kid boy hovered over me, and in a child-like voice that I learned to hate, reassured me that this was for the better of human kind, that this would help speed up science.<strong>

** If science was torture, then I suppose these tests would help speed it up.**

** Diphenhydramine had been the hallucination test. There were other experiments: Physical reactions, mental reactions, internal reactions, organ reactions, the five senses' reactions, the nervous system's reactions, hormonal reactions, spinal reactions, everything you could ever think of and more. The months I spent with the kid boy made the two days I spent with Arnold and Revvy years and years ago pale in comparison; the past ordeal looked like a walk on the beach after the kid boy. **

** Mr. Green Eyes stayed with me every step of the way, encouraging me, lifting my spirits up. Even so, he could only slow my inescapable fate – I reverted back to a broken slate with no thoughts and emotions after the first month of twenty four seven torture. The last slate I had turned into was only cracked half way. **

** This time I was split clean down the middle.**

** Eventually, detectives managed to track the mansion I was being held captive in. Society was shocked – nobody would've thought that one of the biggest suppliers in medicinal science had committed such a heinous crime. Arnold and Revvy were caught again and shoved into prison once more. The Kid-Boy – Leis Slarklaster – was put behind bars after a short and brief trial. He was sentenced to a lifetime of jail. Everything was perfect.**

** Except my mind and my family.**

** Even after the full two and a half months I had spent with Leis Slarklaster, I still had hallucinations because of how much diphenhydramine he had given me, and I won't go into the details of my other body parts. When the detectives had rescued me from the mansion and Leis, my body had been barely recognizable as a human being.**

** When my legal papers had been straightened out and the government officials as well as my parents had decided on what I would do next, I was put in an asylum. **

** However, unlike my first stay in at the temporary asylum, this time I was sent to an **_**asylum **_**asylum.**

** I didn't recognize any of my family members for almost three entire years, and even Mr. Green Eyes had become but distant dream – I was afraid to reach out to anything because I always thought that there would be a possibility of that thing being a hallucination. The doctors tried everything. Medication, every type of therapy known to man, hypnotism, fish-eye placebo; everything. The only treatments that seemed to be working were the physical treatments, and my body gradually got to the point where I could sit in a wheel chair, walk short distances with nurses supporting me at both my sides, crutches by myself, then a walker, and finally by myself without anything helping, even though the nurses still followed me around.**

** Me getting better physically was a huge relief to my parents and the doctors. However, the brief respite because of my bodily breakthrough was short lived – it became prominent that my mind held no possibility of getting better.**

** My family was torn apart. My parents fought and screamed at each other, blaming one another for my condition. 'Why didn't you keep a better eye on her?' and 'She was **_**your **_**responsibility – **_**you**_ **did this to my family!' became constant arguments. My little brother cried all the time. Divorce crept closer and closer towards my parents' relationship.**

** Meanwhile, I was still experiencing hallucinations, and viewed every living thing as a threat. I would only eat vegetables, and even then, I would only eat a select few. Water had to be poured into a cup in front of me before I would drink. I wouldn't go near any type of fizzy drink or juice. I wouldn't go to the washroom unless a nurse or someone else that I had been with for a whole night before stayed in the washroom with me. **

** My thoughts became dull and pessimistic. Contemplating suicide was a normal topic for me. I couldn't bring myself to care about anything. I was never hungry or thirsty. I didn't feel **_**alive**_**.**

** The doctors gave up on me. They told my ready-to-divorce parents that they had done everything they could, and to carry on with life. I was to be kept in the asylum. Otherwise, I was to be put back into a regular routine, with home schooling. Nurses would accompany me during my lessons.**

** After news had gotten out that the poor kidnapped girl was good enough to learn things again, my friends visited the asylum I was kept in but were hesitant to approach me or stay for long. I later learned that the thing that repelled them so much was the lifeless quality my eyes now held, the pallid color of my skin, the numb shuffle of my walk. **

** Some of my old friends poked and prodded the surface of my new demeanor, but when I didn't respond to any of their questions and friendly conversations they gradually drifted away. Friends I had just made in the new school year before being kidnapped and tortured were keen to float away and pretend they never knew me.**

** But there was one boy who I had barely spoken to that kept visiting… and visiting… and visiting me. **

** Ides Orient. The boy with the vibrant green eyes. The boy who called me cupcake.**

** Even though I didn't recognize his face, he still smiled and nodded and visited me.**

** It turned out that he was very talented in music and art. Two weeks into my treatment, Ides turned up beside me one Visiting Tuesday after my parents had exited the asylum with a guitar. I was fiddling with my fingers when he plopped down on my right side. My train of thought then was – due to my hallucinations – 'why my hands were human fingers one moment, and the next werewolf claws'.**

** After watching me twiddle my fingers for a few more moments, Ides opened his mouth and began singing while playing his guitar.**

** Jerking out of my reverie, I had looked up at him in awe. I immediately shoved all thoughts about my werewolf fingers out of my mind, closed my eyes to rid myself of hallucination filled sight and focused solely on his beautiful voice, the beautiful music. **

** For the first time in one year (because I had been one year into my treatment at the asylum), I had my brief respite.**

** Ides's song died out far too soon for my liking. A strangled, wretched noise erupted from my throat, a small sound of protest. Ides merely smiled in response, mussed my hair, and murmured, deep, sweet voice tinkling, "See you later, cupcake."**

** Ides sang to me once every week from then on, bringing a different instrument with him each time. He sang about school, he sang about his life, he sang about the sorrows I'd endured, he sang about the questions he had about me, he sang about whatever came to his mind. His songs slowly brought my sluggish memories back, each resurfacing from the dark murky waters that had once been obscured.**

** Sometimes Ides would improvise songs when he came. He improvised a song for a nurse, once, who he thought was pretty.**

** Once, he improvised a song for me.**

** For the next month afterwards, I was still clinging to Ides's improvised song for me, singing it over and over again in my head.**

** During the twelfth visiting Tuesday of my stay in the permanent asylum, another strangled noise erupted from my throat – the second one during my whole stay, the first being my protest when Ides stopped singing – while my parents were visiting. Eagerly, hoping for a sentence or **_**anything **_**rather than the monotonous silence they had had to listen to and attempt to break, they leaned forward and encouraged me to make another sound. They were disappointed though – that one sound had drained all the energy out of me and I didn't move nor croak throughout the rest of their stay. However, the small sound I had made had rekindled their hope in saving my mentality. **

** I had been trying to hum Ides's song for me. **

** Ides arrived shortly after my parents left, as he always did. He began singing again, and soon, I was crying big, splashy tears. His singing had clicked something inside of my head, and all of a sudden I understood. My life still mattered. There was a **_**reason **_**people always visited me, why this boy in front of me always visited me. **_**It was because they cared about me. **_**In my bouts of mental hysteria and depression, someone caring about me had never even crossed my mind.**

**My problem now was that I didn't know how to communicate anymore – didn't know how to speak, or talk – and still had many hallucinations that sometimes blocked my link with reality. **_**If only they knew**_**, I had thought. **_**If only the doctors knew, they could fix me**_**. I wanted to scream, 'I understand you!' But I didn't know how. The feeling was terrible, and what was even more terrible was the fact that I couldn't express any of my feelings anymore. **

** The nurses became alarmed by my sudden show of tears and quiet bawls. Ides didn't know what to make of it – he stopped singing and instead, pulled out a tissue and tried to mop up my tears, but only more came. My bawls became louder. The nurses told Ides that I had probably had enough for one day, and escorted him out before plopping a still crying me into a wheel chair and wheeling me away.**

** Every time from that incident on, I tried to tell Ides through gestures and grunts (for I knew no other sound to make) that I understood him, knew what he was saying, just didn't have the knowledge to say words anymore because of a long lasting side effect that one of Leis Slarklaster's tests had on me. The nurses didn't know how to respond to my sudden non-stoic-ness and called the doctors by my third communication attempt. The doctors sat down with me, and talked to me in slow soothing tones. I screamed in response while thinking, **_**Didn't they get it? I wanted to learn how to speak again!**_

** It was Ides who asked me, slowly, distinctly, "Do you understand me? Nod once for yes, twice for no."**

** I nodded once, vigorously. **

** But afterwards, I couldn't answer anymore of the questions Ides and the doctors threw at me. Hallucinations had kicked into overdrive, as if they didn't want me to speak with anyone, and a gigantic monster entered my vision. I screamed as loud as I could and stumbled backwards. The monster cackled and ate Ides, before squashing the doctors flat. Its huge, disgusting, warty face, leered at me. Its humongous one eye stared down at me before reaching a massive eleven fingered hand towards me…**

** I fainted, and the doctors' enthusiasm died out along with my consciousness. They had thought that my answering of Ides's question had been a fluke. **

** But it hadn't. The next few times he spoke with me, he didn't sing, but played soft music on his instruments while asking me questions. Each visiting day, he would only be able to get one question in and I would only be able to answer said one question before the monster hallucination stomped into view and ate Ides up, which promptly caused me to faint again. **

** One day, Ides had decided that he had had enough of my answer-then-faint routine, and stormed into the nearest doctor's office. He had thrown the door open before telling the doctor that the next time he visited, one doctor would accompany him while he questioned me and they would have to see that I was still sane. A security guard escorted him out, but he threw a cheery good bye over his shoulder and sauntered out of the asylum.**

** His next visit went as promised: When he saw no doctor waiting beside my usual seat, he practically tore the whole asylum down, running from security the whole time, before demanding a doctor to be present to see his weekly questioning. With a grumbling doctor in tow, and a nurse calling Ides's parents, and guards stationed on either side of me, Ides proceeded to prove to the doctor that I was still sane with simple questions, like, 'How many fingers am I holding up? Nod how many times for whatever number,' as well as slightly harder questions to prove my correct answers weren't just luck, like, 'What's two hundred and thirty seven divided by three? Nod how many times for the number of tens (three nods would be thirty), hold up your hand to switch to ones, then nod how many times for the number of ones (one nod would equal to one).' **

** When I got the answer right – seventy-nine – the doctor began to ask some questions of his own. I was only able to answer one of his questions before passing out. It was just too nerve wracking to answer questions when you thought that your questioners were holding knives and guns to your heart and throat because in my reality, it looked exactly that way.**

** Soon, after much prodding, the doctors found concrete proof that I could understand them and only didn't know how to communicate anymore. They finally found concrete proof that I was still sane. They called off my private school tutor (who had tried to be fired the moment he was hired, after finding out that his student was an unresponsive asylum inmate) and began spending more time on trying to find a cure for my constant hallucinations. They questioned me full time, and informed my parents of their breakthrough. When my parents began to thank them, they waved them off and told them that they should thank a 'charming young man' but by the time my parents called the Orient household, they found a voice message saying 'remember to smile, cupcake'. Ides Orient was never heard from again.**

** Meanwhile, I was relearning the alphabet, and trying to say the sounds of the English language. The doctors asked their doctor buddies all over the world, and together, using the combined force of international knowledge and the promise of more money from my rich parents, they created a new medication that was to help the patient's hallucination problems. With bated breath, they waited for my condition to lessen.**

** It did.**

** My last year at the asylum was much better and more progressive then the last two. By my last day, I had learned all my English sounds, grammar, spelling, etcetera and could speak once more.**

** My first sentence to express my own thoughts was, 'Where's Ides?"**

**I was sad to learn that he had gone. Disappeared, the doctors said.**

** My story made the international news. My parents, who were already famous from being high class lawyers, rose higher and higher in media because of their 'family tragedy'. My little brother acted as if he didn't care at all that I was back, but on my second night home, he knocked at my door around midnight and asked if he could sleep with me because of the thunderstorm outside, just like old times. **

** I was three years behind in my high school studies, but my parents weren't all that worried. They decided to give me a vacation since I had just been saved from insanity and the inability to think at all and 'had earned a well deserved break'. When I asked them what grade I'd be in when I did go back to school, they said that I would go back to where I left off. If I felt weird about it, I could spend the rest of my high school years trying out homeschooling. **

**I slipped back into my old life like it was a worn glove. I was the hand that slipped back into the familiar glove without much resistance. My parents were a tad concerned about this, happy but concerned, and asked a doctor about why I was so calm. The doctor told them that I was in denial, and it'd be good to give subtle reminders, however painful, of my ordeal so that I could shed the protective skin I had thrown up and rejoin reality. **

** I hadn't gotten to that point yet, of ridding myself from denial. After a few weeks of just relaxing at home and having people follow my every beck and call, I decided to go back to school. I was a freshman again, and relearned everything. I ignored the strange stares I received from my peers, and contented myself in making new friends and continuing on with life.**

** One day, my art teacher had given us an assignment, an assignment I wanted to ace. That very afternoon, I set off into my mansion's ravine in search of perfect scenery…**

* * *

><p>I sat, trembling in front of the characters of my nightmares. The blonde pulled out a sharp dagger and inched it towards the other's throat. The man in the mask held up his hands in mock surrender, but then the two began to wrestle, throwing melee moves at each other.<p>

_IdontwantthisDONTWANTTHISdon twantthisatall._

A picture of Leis Slarklaster, Kid-Boy flashed through my mind. He smiled angelically at me.

_DontwantDONTWANTdontwant._

Everything that the blonde threw at the masked guy passed right through the masked guy's body. _Right through_, as if there was nothing there in the first place.

_DontwantdontwantdontwantNONO NONOnooooo…_

Hands were grabbing at me, Arnold and Revvy snatched at me and tortured the other little girls, sickly sweet smells washed over me, Kid-Boy watched me suffer…

_Nononononononononononononono nonooonoooooo…_

The blonde hissed in frustration before stepping back. He crouched low and pulled white stuff out of his pouch, before inserting them into the palms of his hands. There were mouths on his hands.

_Nonononononononodontwanthall ucinationsGOAWAYnonononodont wantdontwantNO!_

A white haze swept all my thoughts from my mind. For the third time of my life, my mind broke.

This time, it didn't crack halfway.

It didn't crack clean down the middle.

It _shattered._


	5. Secrets of the Mind

**Secrets of the Mind**

Deidara waited, crouched in his ready-to-fight position, for his hand mouth to spit a piece of art out. When it did, he smiled devilishly at his partner who gulped and leaped out the window with a loud yelp of, "Senpai!"

Chuckling darkly, Deidara molded the chakra infused clay into a tiny bird, and sent it to fly after Tobi and detonate him. I'll deal with the stupid girl myself, Deidara thought, _without_ that dumb partner to keep me from doing what I want.

"Now, without further ado, hmm…" Deidara muttered, smirking. "Good bye, weird girl."

* * *

><p>Anne was in her mind. It was bathed in white light, and she felt very content.<p>

She had locked herself in a deep place inside her heart, deeper than the first two fractured places she had visited and been dragged out of. Those two places had peep holes that she could sneak out of or be taken out of. When she had been in those two places, she could still feel what her real body felt, and she was still connected to her conscience mind.

This place, this third place, had fifty nine locks on its door and no peepholes whatsoever. Anne had locked the door very securely then slid the keys under the door's little niche so that she would never have to leave, then dusted the place up and stuffed what cracks there were in the room with fluffy white stuff. When she had been barring herself in her small world, Anne had felt slightly hesitant. Wasn't there someone out there waiting for her? Her mother, her father, her brother?

But then Anne remembered; who cares?

That was her mantra, now. Anne was in a place of brilliance, a place close to Heaven, and she couldn't fathom why she'd want to leave. She could have anything here. If being alone and causing her family some grief was the price, then-

Who cares?

I want an ocean, I want to be on a beach, Anne thought. The white light shifted slightly, and gave way to a rectangle of shimmery foam. Taking one step forward, she dove into the foam and immediately felt the cool ocean breeze brush her skin and warm sunshine kiss her face.

She smiled.

Here, I don't have any worries! Anne sang happily, cherishing the feeling of the mounds of soft sand under her feet. Who gives a care for what happens in the real world?

* * *

><p>Deidara lifted the girl up by her hair like he did before. "Who are you, where are you from, what are your motives, and who sent you?" He murmured in his most dangerous voice. "Tell me, hmm. I might just make your death quick."<p>

The girl went on staring straight ahead. She let out a soft, content sigh.

Deidara yanked harder on the girl's hair. "Answer me! How do you mask your chakra?"

The girl stared.

Annoyed, Deidara quickly glanced backwards to look at what the hell this girl was so captivated by. There was a plain bed, a bedside table, another bed, and a closet. Nothing out of the ordinary. Why was this girl so enthralled with the stuff then?

Deidara lifted the girl to eye level and glared at her. "Answer. Me. All my questions, hmm."

The girl continued to stare. She blinked once. Then she went back to staring.

Snatching a kunai from his pouch, he held it up to her throat threateningly, just above her jugular vein. He whispered softly, "Tell me."

The girl didn't flinch. She didn't even blink this time.

Deidara growled. Patience was a virtue he had, but even he couldn't wait all day. He slammed the girl against the wall. She was limp. He slammed her into it again. She continued staring. He kept on slamming her into the wall until her head and shoulder started bleeding and swelling.

The girl didn't do anything.

She didn't scream.

She didn't protest.

She just continued staring.

* * *

><p>Anne skipped along the ocean's shore line. The sand and small rocks felt nice and smooth under her damp feet. She was braiding flowers' stems together right now into a wreath for herself. Once in a while, seaweed or logs would make her trip and fall while she strolled, and she would bang her head and shoulders but-<p>

Who cares?

She flopped down onto her bottom and sat, legs outstretched and basking in the gentle ocean waves lapping at the sand. It was so calm and peaceful here.

Anne wouldn't have minded if she could stay here _forever_.

A glimmer of green flickered under the ocean's cerulean surface and caused Anne to become curious. Weren't oceans always supposed to be blue? I certainly wanted this ocean to be blue, so why did it flash green? Anne asked herself. She decided to investigate. After all, this was _her _realm, and she'd be damned if she let anything spoil it.

Gently placing her half finished flower wreath onto the sandy ground, Anne walked, step by step, into the breezy ocean's embrace.

* * *

><p>Deidara threw the girl across the room where she crashed against the wall and fell facedown onto the floor. "Talk, god damnit, you <em>idiotic woman<em>!"

Stomping up to the girl, he yanked her up by her hair again and screamed, "I said, _talk, hmm_!"

The door to the hotel room slid open creakily. "Ex-excuse me sir, is there something I-I could g-get for y-you?" A petit hotel maid poked her head into the room and dropped the linens she'd been holding onto the floor when she caught sight of the bloodied girl and the blood splattered walls and furniture. Before she had a chance to scream, Deidara had snatched up a kunai and thrown it at her. The kunai buried itself deep into the girl's chest, and a gurgling sound bubbled up from her throat as she slumped forwards. The manager of the hotel rushed in quickly right afterwards, bursting with threats. Deidara threw another kunai. Another, another, another. Each kunai planted itself deep into the man's chest, forming a perfect square.

Turning to the girl, Deidara growled menacingly as he shoved the girl's head towards the two dead corpses. "Do you see that, you _idiot_?! I can _kill you in a split second. _So _talk already, hmm!"_

* * *

><p>The water was over Anne's head now. She briefly wondered how she was going to breathe, but after gulping the ocean water down and finding it refreshing, her worry was banished. Anne sucked in big mouthfuls of the water; it eased the heaviness she had felt against her chest after she had gone into the water.<p>

Her feet were still touching the beach's bank, but just barely. The sand's slope was becoming more and more steep, and soon Anne knew that she would have to swim. Thank goodness I know how, Anne thought detachedly.

It was a wonderful world, in the ocean. Tropical fish swam everywhere in big, colorful schools. Starfish danced with jellyfish in slow, mesmerizing waltzes. Anne even passed a few rainbow dolphins, and one sleek white shark.

The pod of rainbow dolphins chortled with her and allowed her to ride on them. After the ride, they smiled at her and told her, "Anne, remember to swallow more water, okay?"

Anne did as they told her, and felt a great loosening in her chest. She smiled at the pod, and thanked them.

The sleek white shark smirked at her and nudged her gently. She smiled warily at it. "Hello."

It weaved lazy circles around Anne. "Anne, remember, you're human. You don't have fins. You can't breathe under water."

Anne frowned. Wasn't that true? She had been worried about breathing when she had just come to this beautiful place. "I… I can't?"

The shark shook its great head. "You can't. Spit out the water that you inhaled, quick."

Gathering herself, Anne spat out as much water as she could. The instant the water left her body, however, the heaviness in her chest grew into a giant monster and she couldn't breathe at all. Without any choice, she sucked in some more water, and found that the giant monster on her chest shrank slightly, and she could breathe better. Anne frowned at the sleek white shark, and drank in water. "Bad boy!"

Turning on heel as best she could in water, Anne swam away.

Where was that green light she'd last seen on land?

* * *

><p>Deidara stared at the girl and got angrier by the minute.<p>

She was lying limp and passive on the floor in front of him. Her eyes were still open, and her breathing told him that she was still awake. She didn't move, didn't talk, didn't blink, didn't do anything no matter _how _hard Deidara punched her, slammed her into the walls, or hurt her.

She just went right on staring.

There must be something wrong with her, Deidara decided. Not even the _best _shinobi can withstand so much pain without responding even a bit.

Because Deidara was sure the girl's body was in pain. He'd checked her arm when it began to bend at an irregular angle and made sure it was broken by giving it a good stomp. When a noticeable lump formed in the girl's rib area, Deidara had taken specific care to punch said lump repeatedly. On each of the girl's bruises Deidara had used his kunai to carve a shallow, bloody circle in the girl's flesh.

The girl never so much as blinked.

How can someone remain so strong after so much pain? Deidara wondered incredulously. Isn't this _impossible _or something? Maybe she has a genetic defect that makes her immune to pain. Maybe she's only vulnerable to mental hurt? That would explain a lot…

The girl stared.

Deidara slumped onto the floor, and stared right back at the limp, unresponsive figure of the strange girl in front of him. He was at the end of his rope; if she had _such _a high pain tolerance, and was _so _stubborn, than Deidara'd just have to kill her.

He took the moment to study her features. She was slight, around his height and most likely very frail. She'd probably broken a hundred bones while Deidara had been bashing her against the wall. Her hair was a silvery blonde that would have looked nice had it not been caked with blood from her injuries. She was pale, with a heart shaped face and high cheek bones. Her eyes were large, cyan doe eyes. Deidara looked away from those eyes. They were still staring. It was getting eerie.

_She looks kind of like a feminine me, _Deidara thought absently as he fingered the tip of his kunai. He had decided that he wouldn't waste his precious art on someone as unresponsive as her.

Deidara crept up in front of the girl and placed his kunai at the base of her ribs. One quick jab up and it would all be over. "Nighty, night, strange girl," Deidara whispered, glancing up one more time at her eyes.

He clenched his arm muscles and jabbed upward; just not hard enough. Deidara had hesitated at the last second. The kunai pierced through the girl's strange jacket and shirt easily, and a small red blossom of blood stain had appeared.

Deidara had hesitated because of something he'd seen in her eyes.

Hadn't they flashed a vibrant emerald for a split second?

* * *

><p>There! There it was. Anne swam leisurely towards the hazy green light that was bobbing in front of her. She took another deep breath of ocean water, and the lightness she'd been feeling in her heart spread down to her ribs. Anne smiled cheerily.<p>

Anne was fast approaching the light. The dolphins she'd seen earlier looked scared and were trying to drag her farther away from the green, but the shark that had told her to spit out the water was nudging her towards it. "Closer, closer," the shark muttered. "Quickly! Before it's too late!"

She was at the light, and she stretched her right hand's index finger towards it. It was flaringly hot, and when she made contact with it, her world, her beautifully comfortable ocean was engulfed in glassy jade light.

* * *

><p>Deidara gazed into the girl's eyes. That was strange; they were blue again. He frowned. Deidara didn't believe in imagining things, and he certainly didn't believe that he himself was seeing things. He slapped the girl on the cheek lightly, as if it would change her eye color again.<p>

Nothing happened.

Rolling his eyes, Deidara muttered, "Whatever. Doesn't change anything. Still going to kill you."

Placing his kunai at the center of the red blotch of blood on the girl's clothes, Deidara concentrated solely on his kunai, so as not to be distracted by the girl's eyes again.

But staring right back at him through the kunai's gleaming reflection were a pair of furiously glaring emerald eyes in the girl's impassive face.

Deidara quickly pinned the girl to the ground and clutched the girl's fragile throat in his hand. "Stop playing games!" He hissed.

His words fell on deaf ears; the girl had stopped staring, her eyes now closed, and she remained once again irresponsive.

* * *

><p>Anne squinted harshly against the emerald light's brightness. Blinking heavily, she took in her surroundings.<p>

To her right, was a whiteness that extended until who knows where. To her left, was a whiteness that extended just as far.

Whiteness extended up, when she looked at the 'ceiling'. When she looked down, she saw that she was standing on whiteness too.

Where was she?

Anne took a few baby steps forward. She tried to change her surroundings by saying, "I want to go back to the beach. The ocean." But no shimmering foam appeared on the whiteness; no doorway opened up to let her on the beach.

She was trapped.

A low chuckle sounded from behind Anne, and Anne swiveled to face it. What she saw stunned her.

They were two emerald green eyes. They were gigantic, and looked like a cat's eyes; the pupils were slit and as tall as Anne herself. The irises surrounding the deep black pupils were mainly emerald, but an effervescent smattering of gold was also sprinkled here and there. Anne found herself staring and becoming hypnotized in the beautiful eyes. They were bottomless pools of understanding. Images reflected in them; a deer drinking from a stream, a tsunami wrecking havoc, streams and streams of DNA, the devastation of an earthquake, gorgeous forests and jungles filled with tropical animals never before seen and identified. Anne got the feeling that the images she was seeing stretched all the way back to the very beginnings of Earth.

The disembodied voice chuckled again and the eyes crinkled at the edges as if they were smiling. "Hey there, cupcake. Seems like you're in a bit of a tight position."

Cupcake? Anne was confused. Her name was 'Anne', not 'Cupcake'. She sent her prayers to whatever child had parents dumb enough to name them 'Cupcake'. "My name is Anne, and I'm in a perfectly fine position. Who are you?"

The mesmerizing eyes preformed a perfect eye roll. "Yeah, I know your name, cupcake. Whatever. And no, you _are _in a very tight situation." The eyes drew downwards. "I'm hurt you don't remember me. Maybe if…"

The eyes seemed to be spinning, shrinking. They were traveling farther away, into the whiteness, yet they were coming closer at the same time. The figure of a person appeared in the colorless scenery.

The person was dressed head to toe in black; at least, that was what Anne had the impression of. The 'clothes' the person wore shifted around the person's body, like a swirling mass of shadows. What was strange was that even though Anne could clearly distinguish that the garment the person was wearing was black, she couldn't shake the feeling that the black was at times white, other times green, or blue, red, orange and sometimes even a rainbow spectrum. The person was only a few feet away now, and Anne saw that the person was a boy with mossy, dark green hair and dirty, mud caked skin. His black jumpsuit, strangely, seemed to emanate off him, and Anne could've sworn that she saw tendrils of color flying off him.

In a flash of understanding, Anne realized that this teenager was the owner of those enormous green eyes that had been haunting her for years and years.

Those very green eyes took her whole figure in, and Anne suddenly felt very shameful of herself. As if she weren't worthy to be in front of this boy. She wanted to curl up into a ball and disappear under the boy's careful scrutiny. Instead, she contented herself with falling to her knees, clasping her hands tightly together and bowing her head. She murmured meaningless apologies; later, she never could remember why she felt the obligation to do so.

The boy's fine, full red lips twisted slightly to one side as if he couldn't make up his mind. Then, with a one shoulder shrug, he trained his gaze on Anne's bowed blonde head. Anne could tell that the boy was relatively bored. In a quiet voice that managed to sound at once easy, but also harsh, he muttered, "Hey. Remember now?"

Anne didn't want to look up, for fear of being judged. Where was this sudden self-consciousness coming from?

A sigh escaped the boy's lips, and he walked over to her, plopping down right in front of her on his bottom. "You see this is the trouble with humans…"

Anne snuck a glimpse of the boy from the very corners of her peripheral vision and discovered another strange thing about him. He didn't look like he was from any place Anne knew of; it didn't look like he was from Europe, or from either North or South America, or from any Asian country, or from any African or Australian country, and he especially didn't look like he was from Antarctica. It was kind of like… he was all of them, mixed together in one giant lump of human being.

"They are _so_… So…" The boy frowned. "So… Argh! Humans are _so bothersome_!"

He chuckled. "But no matter. Tell me, cupcake, can you talk?"

In her sudden bout of submissiveness, Anne couldn't muster up the will to be confused or rude. "Yes, sir," she murmured politely.

"Don't call me that," the boy snapped. When Anne began praying and murmuring reverences to him even more fervently than before, he sighed, and said. "No, no, stop that. I meant, not _that_ kind of talk. The kind of talk with your mouth, your vocal chords."

The feeling of bafflement crept slowly into the edges of Anne's mind. Wasn't she already talking with her mouth? "I am-"

"No you aren't." The boy seemed slightly impatient now. "Come now, cupcake, I thought you were smarter than that. _This is talking with my mouth._ This is talking with my mind. See the difference?"

Yes, Anne did see the difference. When he said 'this is talking with my mouth', the sound seemed to come from far, far away than when he normally talked. Was he implying that they'd been talking with their minds all this time? That's preposterous.

"Aren't I already talking with my mouth right now, Mister?" Anne asked timidly, but even before he said no, she already knew the answer. Her lips hadn't moved, yet sound had still come out.

"I _said_ not to call me that. Just… Just don't refer to me as anything for now. But anyways, naw," the boy yawned. "Naw you're not talking with your mouth. Here, try this."

Closing the distance between the two, the boy pressed one slim finger onto Anne's chin, and another to her forehead. He lifted her head up, so it wasn't bowed anymore, easily pried open her jaw, than closed it again, and opened it before closing it one last time. "There. Now pretend to form words with your mouth."

"I-"

"No. Don't 'talk'. Just form the words with your mouth. Nothing else."

Anne tried, opening her mouth and maneuvering her tongue the way she would have if she were speaking. The boy smiled slightly, and scratched his grimy cheek with his dirty fingernail. "Good." Switching to verbal dialogue, he said, "_Now, try doing this…_"

* * *

><p>"This is way too creepy," Deidara muttered.<p>

None of his other victims had disturbed him as much as this girl. Was he letting her get to him too much?

"This is talking with my mouth."

Deidara swiveled to stare at the girl. Had she just spoken? It had been barely a whisper, but with his ninja hearing, it had seemed like an explosion in the silence. "What did you say?"

The girl's eyes were still closed, her breathing still even. After a moment's pause, however, her mouth opened in the slightest and she murmured something unintelligible. "Now, try doing this…"

His brows pulled down. What did she say? It sounded something like 'nowu turiau doin disuwa'. But those weren't even words. Deidara half heartedly slapped the girl's cheeks. "Repeat that, or suffer a fate worse than death."

It was safe to say that he was very surprised when the girl's eyes opened, a brilliant green, and sucker punched him in the stomach.

* * *

><p>Anne tried as hard as she could to copy the boy's fluid movements in her attempt to speak with her mouth. Needless to say, she wasn't half as graceful as him, and it wasn't until the boy physically moved her jaw up and down and showed her how to form her tongue to make sounds that she succeeded. Anne had strange quivers of déjà vu all throughout the experience. Someone had taught her to speak before, long ago, when she'd forgotten how to…<p>

"Good," the boy nodded his approval. Happiness vibrated everywhere inside Anne at his compliment. She still didn't understand why she felt so indebted and awed by this particular boy but she wasn't about to ask. A mischievous glint glimmered in the boy's emerald eyes. "Now, cupcake, I think you deserve a good rest."

A surge of fear flooded Anne. "B-but, I don't w-want you to l-leave!"

The boy laughed, and the sound tinkled melodically, melting Anne's panic away. "I'll still be here, don't worry. You have to answer my question though."

Anne smiled. Her eyelids were already drooping; she was so tired. When had she ever felt like she had enough energy to stay awake? It was laughable… "Anything…"

"Do you remember me now?"

In her state of sleepiness, Anne couldn't remember anything. "No…"

_Clap_. The boy had snapped his fingers, and the sound resounded around Anne's ears, erasing all thoughts of sleep. "W-what? I'm sorry, sir, so sorry, I didn't mean to do that, I'm sorry-"

The boy sighed exasperatedly. "Would you stop that? Seriously…. Just answer the question."

Who was this boy? Anne had no idea. But there was something familiar, something that rang a bell in her memories…

"I-Ides Orient?"

The boy laughed cheerily. "Close enough." With a wave of his hand, everything immediately blurred in front of Anne's eyes and she slumped onto the ground. "You can sleep now."

Anne's eyes were sliding closed when she saw the hazy figure of the boy lie down beside her. Warmth enveloped her, and the last words she heard from the boy were, "Just let me borrow you for a few days…"

* * *

><p>Deidara staggered backwards, caught off guard for a split second. He recovered almost immediately and twisted sideways, swinging his right leg up to kick the girl who was now standing up. The girl snarled, and brought her forearms up to her left side in a defensive x, effectively blocking his kick.<p>

Leaping backwards, Deidara's mind scrolled through what was happening at a break neck pace. How could the girl move like this? How could she manage to block my kicks? She has no muscle, and even if she did, a bunch of her bones are broken! Her ribs are broken, her arms are probably broken, and she's got wounds everywhere. Maybe an extremely experienced shinobi could still move around with all those injuries, or an S-rank masochist, but definitely not the low level spy Deidara had thought the girl to be. What is this?!

The girl charged Deidara head on, her fingers bared like claws. Squaring his feet, Deidara quickly stuffed his hands into his clay pouches and dodged the girl's swipes at him. Bracing his right arm and leg against the floor boards, Deidara snapped his left leg up in a swift kick, catching the girl in her hurt rib. She coughed up some blood, the droplets landing on Deidara's face, before the girl shuddered tremulously and fainted forward, landing on Deidara, limbs sprawled at her sides.

Deidara blanched as he shoved the girl away from him. This is getting too weird, Deidara thought. That's it – no more hesitations. Just aim and throw a kunai at her head and it'll all be over…

The kunai was about to leave the hold of Deidara's fingers when it happened.

Suddenly, the whole room began to tremor as a quake shook the hotel's very foundations, knocking Deidara's aim off and making the kunai lodge harmlessly against the head board of the bed. Deidara quickly backed away from the girl, shoving one hand into his clay pouch and the other into his kunai pouch. At the window, his hand mouth spat out a bird and Deidara threw it out the window and enlarged it while his other hand shot kunai after kunai at the girl. With each shot the hotel lurched backwards, then forwards, then right, then left, making Deidara miss all of his attempts. He cursed and decided to just blow the entire hotel up high in the air. Half his body was out the window when he faltered for a moment, turning and pushing himself off the window's ledge from curiosity. A deep dark rumbling was reverberating from somewhere…

A large brown tree root burst out of the floor boards, rupturing the wood, and wrapped itself around the girl tenderly. Deidara sucked in a breath sharply. Who was behind all of this crazy stuff? Deidara wondered almost dazedly. It's even weirder than _my _normal life…

Another root snaked in through the closed door of Deidara's room, past the dead bodies of the manager and maid and made for the girl. Another, another, another.

One root slowly, stealthily, began to creep towards Deidara.

Catching sight of it, Deidara stood very still. He counted, _One, Two…_

_Three!_

Deidara swung his leg out the open window and vaulted into the open space. The tree root sprang after him, twisting demonically and rapidly closing the distance between Deidara and itself. Close to the ground now, his clay bird broke his fall, and began a vertical ascent, straight up. The tree root seemed to be slightly confused, staying immobile for a second in the cool night air before swaying back into the hotel room to curl around the girl. When Deidara and his bird reached the window, Deidara slowed his bird down, so that they were both suspended in the air and he could see what had happened to his suite.

What seemed to be an entire army of roots had overtaken the whole room. In the very center, surrounded by bushes that had lavenders and white irises blooming everywhere, Deidara could just barely make out the girl lying peacefully. A dim emerald glow seemed to be washing over her body, up, down, up, down.

Deidara blinked, and in the split second he couldn't see anything, the girl and the flowers had all disappeared, leaving a colossal tangle of roots with a vengeance to crush the room.

The clay bird Deidara made flapped upwards, and the farther up he flew, the more damage he could see was being done to the hotel. Tiny specks of black were fleeing the scene; hotel workers and customers, he supposed.

The hotel had been, literally, squashed by the masses of roots. It was like a huge, unforgiving cradle that yearned to kill anything that was unlucky enough to fall inside it. Tree roots stretched out from the inside of the hotel, pierced into the hotel, and winded around the outside of the hotel until the whole structure was absorbed. And yet the tree appendages still spiraled upwards, reaching farther and farther up.

Towards Deidara.

Cursing, he spun his bird around and escaped the place at top speed, roots flinging themselves after him.

_I guess I can't go back and blow the hotel up now… _Deidara thought glumly. Then an uneasy thought occurred. _I'll have to inform the rest of the Akatsuki, too, about this._

The roots and hotel soon became tiny specks in the distance as he flew beyond the small hamlet.

Later that week, civilians would come and marvel at the enormous plant that had completely annihilated their town's only hotel.

In the very centre of the writhing throng of roots – in what used to be a certain bomber's room – would be a tiny emerald glow.

Pulsating.

Growing.

Waiting.

* * *

><p>So, people! How are you guys doing in your lives? Mine is very messed up.<p>

But never mind. Hope you like the chapter and everything else.

Sending vodka and sunflowers,

Ami


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